Essay · 10 min read

How to build demand before you launch

Justin Jackson · justinjackson.ca Free Intermediate

Jackson uses how bands sell out tour dates, announcing months ahead, building anticipation in stages, as a working template for a launch email sequence you can copy directly. It's concrete: he shares his own multi-week send schedule and reports over 80 percent of his launch revenue came from that list, not cold traffic.

  • Collect emails from day one, then build anticipation in stages over weeks, not just one launch email
  • A staged sequence (announce, details, sneak peek, launch, last chance) mirrors how bands sell out shows
  • Your mailing list, not social reach, is usually where most of your launch-day revenue comes from
Open on justinjackson.ca ↗

The question it answers

  1. How do I build up an audience before I launch so it's not just crickets?

Read with it

  1. The permission slip to recruit users by hand, do things manually, and deliver 'insanely great' experiences to your first few... paulgraham.com Essay · ~15 min read Do Things That Don't Scale Paul Graham
  2. The definitive talk that reframes launching from a one-shot event into a repeatable tactic, exactly this category's thesis. YC... YC Startup Library Video · ~25 min How to Launch (Again and Again) Kat Manalac (Y Combinator)
  3. From the founder of CMX and author of The Business of Belonging, a practical framework for deciding whether to build community... Lenny's Newsletter Article · ~25 min read A Founder's Guide to Community David Spinks
  4. Arvid Kahl bootstrapped and sold a SaaS solo, and now publishes the most practical ongoing guidance for one-person and... thebootstrappedfounder.com Podcast · long The Bootstrapped Founder (blog & podcast) Arvid Kahl
  5. This is the canonical argument that you do not need a mass market to build something real, you need a small number of people... The Technium (kk.org) Essay · ~15 min read 1,000 True Fans Kevin Kelly
  6. This is the most concrete walkthrough of how to test a niche when you have nothing built yet: put up a page describing the... kromatic.com Essay · ~15 min read Fake Door / Smoke Test Kromatic (The Real Startup Book)
eChai Partner Brands The partnership →